To rousing applause, Barack Obama formally announced this afternoon that the Democratic National Committee will follow his lead and begin refusing donations from registered lobbyists and special-interest political action committees.

“They do not fund my campaign,” the presumptive Democratic nominee told a small-town southwest Virginia crowd, after delivering a standard refrain that blames drug and insurance interests for blocking universal health care. “They will not fund our party. And they will not drown out the voices of the American people when I’m President of the United States.”

Well, at least not on the presidential level.

The Obama campaign confirms that two other arms of the national party – the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee – will continue to accept lobby and PAC money this election. That’s the same position as presumptive Republican nominee John McCain and every affiliate of the Republican National Committee, who all accept lobby and PAC dollars.

To make this clear, lobbyist PACs will continue to fund the Democratic Party, regardless of what Obama claimed earlier today. That has to be the fastest flip-flop since Hillary Clinton changed position on illegal-alien drivers licenses within 120 seconds last November. Obama clearly intended people to believe that the entire party had orders to turn down these donations, which even they acknowledged was false from the beginning.